


Rabenmutter

by Freffers



Category: RWBY
Genre: Blood and Injury, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-03
Updated: 2016-10-03
Packaged: 2018-08-19 09:51:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8200708
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Freffers/pseuds/Freffers
Summary: An inauspicious birth, and the aftermath.





	

They are twins.  
  
The same piteous bawl, the same colourless complexion, the same wet knot of down in the same spot on their scalps. The same eyes, like black blood beneath the blur of tears.  
  
An auspicious thing, although their birth is not. The sky is charcoal, the sunset smoke and embers.  
  
Auspicious also that they are born in this way, horizontal, featherless and awake. Not for their mother. Humanity was cursed to bear this pain long ago, but she had hoped to avoid it, hoped to sneak away and live under the moon, raise her brood as the kin did. Her body thought better, for nine months refusing her this mercy; they would be delivered human. Only now, after a long and agonising labour, is she released.  
  
This has killed her, she realises. But for the time being she is still alive, and that is some small kindness, for her and her two children.  
  
  
Their lineage is a long one, unspoken in these times but still potent, still remembered. They will walk between the worlds - as do all heroes, though this is a matter of blood and transcends mere metaphor. If they are successful, they shall belong to both.  
  
For now, they have no names. They will take on their own, in time, once the dangers of the night find them and try to claim them. They will escape, always, for their blood _runs_.  
  
They scream, these ugly, snub-nosed chicks. There is nothing of the fey beauty they shall later wear. Their mother loves them nonetheless. She is sorry to leave them, for the daytime carries dangers too, worse ones, as long as the sun is blinding and the people live in fear.  
  
No choice, now. She cannot protect them, nor offer the hope of a good life, but she can at least give them a life.  
  
  
One arm carries both newborns. Another ties the bloodied rag around her hips, a paltry but genuine attempt at modesty. Standing takes an eternity. The dust clings to the backs of her legs and between her thighs, a reminder that 'auspicious' does not mean 'sanitary'.  
  
The Faunus - their name repeats in her, _the Faunus_. Heaven willing she will encounter them before their more populous cousins. They are ostracised and less likely to ostracise in turn. In the case of her children, a desperate and unfounded hope.  
  
She stumbles as she walks. Perhaps the children hate her for this. They refused to feed - unnatural, she thinks, worrying. Now the opportunity has passed. If they are to survive, she cannot stop to try again. They remain naked, and the evening chill must sting terribly, but what does she have to clothe them with?  
  
The mother holds her children yet tighter to her chest, tiny hearts beating against her own, and prays that they will forgive her someday.  
  
  
She walks for hours. The light fades quickly from the sky; the moon is faint tonight. The ground alternates sand and grass and rock. Nothing can live out here except the undead. Come Grimm a second time, and neither the mother nor her children will have any chance of survival.  
  
Her pace increases. The trio have found a rhythm: heartbeat, step, heartbeat, step, a gentle four-part pattering keeping time above it. The children no longer make noise - they might even be asleep - but just as likely they simply lack the strength to cry.  
  
The world that awaits them will demand that they find it, and fast. Their mother knows well that it does not forgive weakness, particularly amongst their Folk. In such circumstances death might be a generosity, but she will not contemplate that, and she presses on.  
  
  
After a while the earth softens underfoot. Black shadows of shrubs start to appear across the landscape, though they promise nothing to the mother, only reassurance that she has made the right decision.  
  
Her heartbeat becomes urgent. It pounds: _your-time, your-time_. Something else has ruptured inside her, another complication brought about by necessary haste. She is losing more blood. It runs down her legs, sticky and dark and fast. She cannot afford to pay it any heed.  
  
And then, in the distance, a glimmer of light. It is consistent, not like the sparks that dot her vision, and too low and yellow to be a star. Therefore, real. She must have faith. Breathing laboured, body curled over itself, she sets her course.  
  
She is in luck, for the light approaches her also. It splits and becomes two, four; a caravan. They reach her quickly, and from their mounts and wagons emerge dark, loud figures.  
  
She does not know if they are Faunus or not - her vision has become too hazy - only that they are shaped like her and talk in words. She cannot be choosy, she cannot delay. With blood-stained arms she presents her children, not offering but demanding, _take them, take them_.  
  
She gives the travellers her name, not as her own but as theirs. It will carry something of her with it, and the romance of that thought is her comfort in failure.  
  
It would be wise to accept the travellers' panicked offers of help, to play the part and die caged like one of their kind. But she is driven by blood now, and it commands her - as it always has - to run.  
  
She turns and flees.  
  
The children will learn that she was a mother who abandoned her own offspring, a coward who refused to care for them, undeserving chaff that they are. She hasn't the presence of mind to realise this.  
  
  
Branwen only takes flight once the caravan is far behind her, black wings stretching one last time, stretching wide as if she were already soaring - but she is not, and the bird's corpse falls barely a metre before hitting the ground.

**Author's Note:**

> We've yet to learn anything concrete about the Branwen history. Needless to say, I hope mama Branwen has a better time of things in canon.


End file.
